Bizarre White House photo: Students watch as US President Donald Trump signs order to dismantle Department of Education

Flanked by students and educators, US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order intended to essentially dismantle the Federal Department of Education.

The order would leave school policy almost entirely in the hands of states and local boards, a prospect that alarms liberal education advocates.

The order will “begin to eliminate” the department, Trump said at a signing ceremony in the East Room of the White House. Shuttering the department completely requires an act of Congress, and Mr Trump lacks the votes for that.

“We’re going to be returning education, very simply, back to the states where it belongs,” Trump said.

The order follows the department’s announcement last week that it would lay off nearly half of its staff. It is the latest step by Trump, who has been in office some two months, to reshape the US government and upend the federal bureaucracy.

Education has long been a political lighting rod in the United States, with conservatives favouring school choice policies that help private schools and left-leaning voters largely supporting programs and funding for public schools.

Fights about US education accelerated during the coronavirus pandemic, a divide Trump tapped into as a presidential candidate.

Mr Trump has said he wants Education Secretary Linda McMahon, who attended the White House event, to put herself out of a job. His executive order seeks to whittle the department down to basic functions such as administering student loans, Pell Grants and resources for children with special needs.

“We’re going to shut it down and shut it down as quickly as possible,” Trump said. “It’s doing us no good.”

Though Republicans control both chambers of Congress, Democratic support would be required to achieve the needed 60 votes in the Senate for such a bill to pass.

At the event, Trump suggested the matter may ultimately land before Congress in a vote to do away with the department entirely.

He was joined at the ceremony by Republican governors such as Greg Abbott of Texas and Ron DeSantis of Florida. He also credited the conservative advocacy group Moms for Liberty.

The department oversees some 100,000 public and 34,000 private schools in the United States, although more than 85 per cent of public school funding comes from state and local governments. It provides federal grants for needy schools and programs, including money to pay teachers of children with special needs, fund arts programs and replace outdated infrastructure.

It also oversees the $US1.6 trillion in student loans held by tens of millions of Americans who cannot afford to pay for college outright.

Ahead of the ceremony, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt cited disappointing literacy levels and testing scores among American children as justification for scaling back the department, which was founded in the 1970s.

Trump has acknowledged that he would need buy-in from politicians and teachers’ unions to fulfil his campaign pledge of fully closing the department.

“See you in court,” the head of the American Federation of Teachers union, Randi Weingarten, said in a statement.

US Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat, said in a statement: “Donald Trump knows perfectly well he can’t abolish the Department of Education without Congress - but he understands that if you fire all the staff and smash it to pieces, you might get a similar, devastating result.”